Head in the Clouds – Feet in the Dirt

Well… today ended up a bit fuller than I anticipated.
And here it is after 1am and I am only starting to write this now!
Anyway, after all my whinging about the weather – we ended up with a gorgeous day. The wild wind has subsided and all trees still hanging in there! Only a slight breeze.

The tide was about right so I went down to see if there was any seaweed on the beach. Lucky me!
So I filled about 15 bags – the garlic and onion patches will finally get mulched!
An older couple arrived after I did with the same idea – not as many bags though! I helped them carry and load some of theirs and had a nice chat. I think all the gardeners were happy to get a respite from the wild weather!

Jeff was sleeping today as he is at work now.
I figured I’d go catch up with Ruby and see what she was up to!

She didn’t have her hearing aides in and I gave her a bit of a fright when I finally got her attention! She had a good giggle though!
I enticed her outside to pose under her beautiful magnolia for a few snaps before we boiled the kettle.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be this photogenic when one is nearly 103 years old???

So we made our hot drinks and I enjoyed a few stories today.
I need to share this one with you –
Back in the very early days when her first husband Bill was building their house, they had a cousin come and stay. Lottie.
Lottie was warned about the toilet door not being finished and not to close it as the latch was on the outside.
You can guess what Lottie managed to do about midday.
Yup… clink. Locked in the loo!!

Unfortunately Ruby wasn’t due home until after 4pm so Lottie was at a bit of a loss – she got up to the window and considered shouting to a neighbour – but in those days… neighbours were rather far away. So that was no good.
She found a bag of ladies products on the back of the door and found that the pad had a useful hook on it (From the days when sticky backings wasn’t a thing), pulled the hook out and managed to MacGyver her way out of the locked door!!
I’ve heard of picking a lock with a hairpin, but a sanitary napkin??
Should have heard Ruby laugh telling that story!

There are certainly some pretty spring flowers happening about Ruby’s place.

Ruby has a second compost she is using because these lovely potatoes have taken over the usual one. Hoping to nurture them to get a bit of a feed out of them!

And check out her silverbeet!!

It was a lovely afternoon.
I took my leave and did some mundane things on the way home (like get petrol)
I wasn’t long home and Fiona turned up with her lamb!

Poor little Frankie, one of a set of triplets, was rejected by her mum… and Fiona of course came to the rescue.
She is so adorable. (Yes, Frankie is a girl. I’ll have to ask Beau about that choice of name haha)

She is all legs and bouncy – and of course follows you about like the nursery rhyme lambs.
Fiona has been taking her to school but thats proving a bit of a stress… so I am going to Lamb-Sit during school hours and give the required bottles and run arounds after (Hopefully on the grass so she can wee etc)

Frankie is arriving early tomorrow (well… early according to my usual schedule) so I better scoot and make a start on sleep!

Hope everyone is having a splendid week so far!
Cheers

Wow – as I am typing this I am wondering if the house will be in one piece by morning!! The wind is feral out there. The gusts are actually a bit frightening! The big trees just out the front of our house are taking a beating – and are being blown in our direction. Limbs and sticks are constantly hitting the house.
I wouldn’t say its a comforting sound!
Usually I enjoy the wind.
But its been high and constant for days. Once it stops it will be a bit eerie without the noise.

So – I’ve not done anything super exciting (again). We did go down to Fossil Bluff in the wind and rain to look for agates just to get out of the house.
I got my seed order! Very exciting.
I can’t plant for a while yet, but its fun to be ready to go!

My cabbages still aren’t really doing much. Honestly they are a lost cause this year.
Never mind.

A little patch of liliums are looking lovely. Luckily they are in a reasonably sheltered spot.

The snow peas that I put in the hothouse a while back are starting to grab things and climb. That’s encouraging!

The worms are busy and seem to be doing well.
I’ve got a nice little bucket of worm wee ready to be used on something.

Check it out! 4 plump asparagus spears!
How does everyone cook them? I was thinking just a little steaming with butter and garlic salt. Can you believe I’ve never cooked them before?

No doubt our new display cabinet will be a continual work of rearranging and adding.
Its looking pretty and colourful so far.
I want to fill the bottom completely with shells and driftwood. (Of which I know we have plenty of)

Anyway, we’ve been making good use of the fire. We didn’t light it until later this afternoon (being brave and saving on wood) Once it was lit, we didn’t stray far from it!!

Hope everyone’s week is going along well!
Cheers!

Hi there!
Honestly not much exciting going on here. Totally hanging out for the weather to be not miserable, raining, cold and windy.
But – I’d noticed the daffodils in next doors paddock out in bloom, so I suited up in the wet weather gear this afternoon and went to liberate a bucketful.

I think a lot have been trampled and chewed by the cows (and fertilised haha) but there were still plenty for me to get.

Brrrr – it was nice to get back inside to the fire!

A nice bit of indoor cheer!

Earlier in the day, Jeff and I FINALLY got around to putting this glass cabinet together!
I bought it just before I went to Queensland but it sat in its (really large and in the way) box until today.

We managed to get it all together without breaking anything or signing divorce papers! Not bad eh?
We’ve got so many interesting rocks/shells etc it’s going to be great having them in mostly one place. The mirrored back gives you a look at the specimens back side and the light in the slate room is generally pretty good so its something people will notice when they walk in.
(Like… wow… these people are REALLY nerdy)

Jeff had a nice time this afternoon beginning to arrange all our treasures. I didn’t get a snap of a lot of it because the light was pretty much gone by the time I finished playing around with daffodils!
Anyway, its looking great!

I think we have at least another day of rain before things start clearing up. Fingers crossed. I need to be out in that garden!

Cheers!

You might have noticed I am not one for taking dinner photos.
It just seems such an effort when you don’t have a camera phone and you have to lug over the big camera, then download and photoshop etc etc.
By the time I have sorted dinner out I am ready to scoff.
Also the light is usually blah
Anyway… I did take a snap of this salad. I don’t think I made it look very appetising …
Its one of my favourites. Pretty simple. Rocket, feta cheese and my pickled beetroot.
I took out the eye fillets and Jeff BBQ-ed them to perfection, green salad, rocket salad and potato salad (No photos – you have to imagine it)
We ate ALL the eye fillet steak in one go that I picked up the other day!
Zero regrets.
They were amazing!
I am now going to waddle off to bed – I HAVE to do a hike tomorrow.
Cheers!

I am bushed tonight!! I think I shouldn’t have done quite as much as I did. Maybe tomorrow I’ll take it easy?
I still feel a bit ‘top heavy’ with this cold.

Anyway, today I attended to more of the cooking – to add to the raspberry jam I cooked up 3lb of the plum pulp into plum/cinnamon jam. Looking forward to tasting that tomorrow to see if it is a winner or a disaster!
Then I can cook up the last 2lb accordingly.

I also made the BBQ sauce. I only meant to do stage one, but got overly keen and decided to continue and finish it up… which mean I was still bottling up sauce at 7.30 this evening.
Have I mentioned that I am over doing dishes?

Anyway – its done… complete with eclectic group of bottles.
I owe a local lady 7 standard bottles to finalise my payment for the lamb she gave me haha
It rained a lot today. While it was taking a break I did the usual yard run about to feed the chooks and bring up a new lot of firewood etc etc.
I meant to get back to the freezer to juggle the meat around that I put in yesterday. It should be ok… I put lots of layers of newspaper between them so things shouldn’t get welded together.

Big box of mince meat (Ground beef 🙂 ) 16kgs of it.
Its good to go and help pack. That way you can choose how you want certain things done. I didn’t want silverside (corned beef) or the shin so that went into mince.
And I choose to have the roast cut into steaks.
Plus I can pack them all in the right quantities for Jeff and myself.

Combined with what is still in the freezer, the supermarket isn’t going to get a lot of business out of us for a while.

Anyway – time for me to take my sneezy self to bed!

Hope everyone else is nice and germ-free!
Cheers!

Hello!
I didn’t get around to sorting new photos – so its only a bit of a dash by from me tonight.
Yesterday I caught a cold. So annoying.
I was fine all day – was clearing space in the freezers, made some raspberry jam, went to visit Ruby (eep – bit worried about that) Got some of my bricabrac out of her shed, came home then noticed a sore throat (I just thought it was shed dust) – then got sniffly! Just like that!

Its been raining all day.
I went to my cousins this morning to pack and collect 1/4 cow for the freezer.
16kgs of mince and lots of beautiful steaks – we’re going to be eating grand for a while!
Came home and put on a slow cooked beef casserole – one of those meals where you just make it up as you go along – not to mention throwing various things in it out of the freezer when you are desperate for space!

I seem to have done a lot of dishes today. On the upside? No cooking for a few nights as there are plenty of leftovers.

Anyway – I think tomorrow I have to make more jam and sauce – part of my freezer clean out.
Honestly – there was 20 litres of plum pulp!!! I gave some to Margie… so now I am down to 16 litres haha.
I. Am. Banned. From. The. Supermarket.
Ok – I might need more sugar and vinegar for cooking and maybe some milk, but we NEED to live out of what we have for a good long while!

Hope your day was awesome!
Cheers

Look at that for another gorgeous winters day!! Totally lapping it up.

Same same for me today. (Well – I did a lap of the river walk with Jeff first – working on that winter padding haha)
I just weeded and mulched.

I think everything is now just a sea of straw!!

A little trimming was also involved.

I cleaned out the dish and the rocks so the pollinators have a nice little spot to get a drink.
It does evaporate quickly in the warmer weather so have to make a point of keeping an eye on it.
The rosemary bush was totally humming with bees today! So nice!

In other news… I’ve emailed the tree-guy.
It will take him a couple of weeks to get back over here.
We have some significant sized branches cracking and looking a bit dodgy – we don’t linger under them!!

Anyway – that’s pretty much the news from today!
Hope your week has started well!
Cheers

Hi!!
Another pretty nice day today! No good excuses to laze about indoors.
I decided to ignore the main veggie patch for a while longer and made a good start on the side herb/flower bed.

The iris and tulip bed was starting to look a bit scrappy. So I weeded it all – and along the fence and chucked a heap of straw on top, sprinkled with blood and bone and gave it a good watering. I am assuming the bulbs will continue to poke up through the straw.

There is a garden in there somewhere…

All sorts of better!

Before and after photos are so satisfying. It makes me happy.
Lets have another set:

I am so glad I managed to get those bales of straw earlier in the year. Going to be very handy over the next month or so! It just instantly makes things look better as well as doing a few jobs!
I still have the top part of the garden to get under control but was pleased with how far I got today. Not such an eyesore now.

One of the new raised beds is ready for its topping of compost and soil! I am a bit excited about that! I also sprinkled this with the remaining blood and bone and watered it in.
The other one got a few more prunings. Jeff collected my coffee grounds today for me so I’ll throw them into the bottom before layering it up further.

Its supposed to rain tomorrow.
I am planning on using an upcoming rainy day to sort out the freezers. I am getting 1/4 cow this week and I REALLY need to make some space.
Emergency cooking coming right up!
There are a lot of raspberries, chillis, tomatoes, plums etc. Will be quite an afternoon of discovery I think!

Hope your day was great
Cheers!

Hello!
What a beautiful day! The perfect winters day – I even got hot and sweaty!!
Yesterday we did a bit of mulching. Sadly the chipper didn’t really take the prunings very well so we had to give up – destined for the fire pit.
I did get the rest of the tree branches that had been set aside through.
I popped them on the path near the garlic and around some of the raised beds.

Want to see an overall view of my main patch??
Its not pretty….

Jeff took out the blackcurrant tree/bush which was rarely made use of and was really mostly in the way.
Its hard to know what to tackle first hey? But if I get a good run of mostly nice days, I will be able to slowly wind it all back under control.

So – I really felt today I needed to get stuck into this ‘building site’. I had to dig up all the grass – which ran along the top there and along the top side of the new raised beds…
That took forever!
I couldn’t quit though until I had evened out the mounds of dirt – it was going to make me feel better inside 😀

And from the other side:

I dug up a lot of glass and crockery today! I cut my finger – but didn’t notice until tonight. In the end I got gloves on because every sod was hiding a shard of something sharp.
Todays odd finds?
I think a little toy car. Very old and a bit squashed. And VERY heavy.

And what is it with me digging UP holes??
This one is dead-dodgy…

Oh look – a hidden solar light.
Upon pulling it up?

Its like a drain… there is a pipe hole down there, water and a decent cavity. Debating on calling the plumber to have a squizz at it for us.
Its not smelly so not assuming anything septic – its not fully fragrant either! And its right off the back veranda!

Anyway – Thats me, totally overdoing things for the day!
A lot of my body parts are in serious conversations with my brain.
Nah – I am just being dramatic. I am sore but I am still functioning and really hoping I get a few more days of sunshine to keep up the garden work!
Hope your weekend was super!
Cheers!

Hello!
So – the other day. It was raining (a lot) and it wasn’t warm (really cold) but we decided to walk along Anniversary Bay and follow the coastline up to our favourite shell fossicking beach to see if we could find some cowries.
You know… because thats high on our ‘Must Do’ list (that I currently need a small bound book to keep them in haha.)

I just love the rocky shoreline. Its a real scramble picking your way across. We were at low tide, so plenty of the shore was exposed so we could walk over it.

I am pretty sure above is a sharks egg case. Cool huh?
The rain eased off so I was able to get the camera out for a few snaps.
It got put away when I had to use all hands and feet to get across some of the rocks though.

Along the way we could hear the black cockatoos calling out – and there they were! Chowing down on the seed pods in the bushes!
I didn’t have a suitable lens but nevertheless I was able to get reasonably close and they weren’t particularly fazed by our presence

They really are a beautiful bird – they have a distinctive cry – like a squeaky gate!!

If I get my act together, some time and enthusiasm, I’d like to return with the longer lens.

Ever changing rock colours

A small stream crossing. (Yes, by this point I have at least one wet foot)

You can tell its not just a normal hike or walk with the rocks to navigate over!
There is so much to look at too, whether you are looking at the big views or the small details.

This is an elephant snail!! I was so surprised to see one. It was a bit high up on the tide line too. The shell isn’t normally so visible as the soft parts of their body often cover most of it. Quite a fleshy creature and was a good addition to mealtimes for the Aboriginal people who used to live in the area.

Eventually we reached the sections where lots of shells had washed up and started having some fun searching through them

The cowries in this area on the beach are generally only small. That day we found the most we have ever found! I didn’t get a photo of our ‘loot’ but there were heaps!

Once we stopped, we got a bit chilled fairly quickly. Luckily the sun decided to put in an appearance at this point.

Jeff – in Overland Mode – had brought the gear to make us up some hot drinks!

That was very welcome indeed!

Is this living the high life or what?

Eventually we had to start the trek back as the tide was coming back in. Wasn’t keen to do any wading that day.

What a beauty! Even managed to get this back home in one piece!!

I left this one on the shore. I suspect it hadn’t finished decomposing the insides. Best left behind!
Oh and remember my ‘Not Ambergris’ story?
Well… there are more samples of that dreadfully smelly sponge on the beach at the moment too.

I’d forgotten how diabolically stinky it is!!

A much less stinky and more pretty sponge!!

All in all, it was a fabulous day out – just what we needed!
Hope everyone is having a great weekend!
Cheers!